Happy Families
by Friends Babe
Summary: After Holby Tina took the easy option, followed her head not her heart. Can this still lead to that perfect, happy family?


_This was written a while ago, and is mainly based around Tina. Read and review please!_

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**Happy Families**

Things never work out the way you plan. It sounds blunt but it's a fact. You spend your life wishing for that perfect wedding with that gorgeous hunk who you'll spend the rest of your life with. You end up marrying a 25 stone bloke in the local registry office and then divorcing him three years later. Or you want to be a nurse, you want to change lives, help people. You never realise until it's too late that you might need help yourself. And that by changing other people's lives you let yours slip. Only realising when you suddenly wake up and realise that life's passed you by and everything you wanted you haven't got. And everything you've got you never wanted.

I never wanted the whole family thing. The big wedding, fancy cake, 2.4 children and a dog. I just wanted to be a nurse, that was all. And maybe, one day, find someone who'd accept me for who I was. Sometimes you put too much effort into not being someone that you involuntarily become them. I wake up every day now, a married mum of three. Don't get me wrong I love my kids, I wouldn't be without them for the world. I just wish things were simpler, that's all. I don't want much. Just simplicity.

I met my husband at the hospital. Thought we were a match made in heaven. We weren't. After the first affair we split up, then there was mine. That didn't help. But we kept together. A united front, ignore the pain and it will all go away. It didn't. We tried everything. Moving away, it drove us further apart. A baby. Michael just meant I was at home alone and he was out having fun. We moved again. That was better. Michael was older, I could work, I began to trust him again. Then the second affair happened. Nothing important, a one night stand that was all. He loved me, he was sorry. It would never happen again. Then we had Evie. Our last hope. This time he stayed at home. I went out to work. It was so much better. Things were going great. We had our first family holiday, we actually had a child because we loved each other and not to try and save our crumbling marriage. Amelia. She was our angel. After she was born things were great. We loved each other and I finally believed that things were going to be OK. But like I said, things never work out the way you plan. Michael's 10 now, Evie 6 and Amelia 3. I love them all to pieces but sometimes it just gets too much you know? To pretend that when he comes in we have a kiss and a cuddle, put the kids to bed and stay up watching a film. It's too hard sometimes. Everything just builds up inside you until you think you're going to burst. You just want to scream it to everyone. You want them all to know that you're unhappy. But you know you can't. Because of the kids. Because it's none of their business. Because you have a reputation. The list goes on but it is hard. To realise that your husband isn't coming home, and that he's probably spent the night with someone. It hurts more when there's no pain. When you get to the point that there's no alarm, no sadness, no anger. It's just something he does. I play the lottery, this is his vice.

When I married him I didn't expect flowers and chocolates. I didn't expect to see Cupid whenever we were together. But I expected some things. The things I know now I'll never get. The things I know I deserve. The things my kids deserve. The things I know I'll never get. All because I was too afraid to walk away when I had the chance. To go back to where people knew me, where people loved me. Where I loved them. They'll all be long gone now. Dead, retired, moved on. They probably won't even remember me. No one will want to help me anyway. No one wants a single mum with three kids living under their roof while she sorts herself out. That's just another excuse I suppose. Another reason why I stay. I'm married because of the kids, or the reputation, or the mortgage, or my fear that I'll be all alone in a strange city that has been my home for the past 7 years. I don't stay because I love him. I stopped that years ago. But the happy families continued. Holidays abroad, dropping the kids off at school, dinner parties for his boss. No one ever guessed. No one ever would. Unless one of us did something about it. Unless one of us picked up the phone and asked for help. Unless one of us admitted that this was a no-win situation and it would be better the accept the truth rather than carry on a charade. I knew he never would. His precious job meant too much to him. It was down to me.

And that's why I'm here now. About to dial that number. To ask for help. To admit that I can't do this anymore. To see if someone will remember me, will help me. He's the only person I could think to call. I dialled the phone and heard it ringing.

"Hello?" he asked. I froze. My fear kept pushing it's way up. I tried to ignore it, to speak but it wouldn't go away.

"Hello?" he asked again. This time I answered

"Sean? It's Tina Seabrook, well Gallagher. I heard you'd come back from Oz and I just wondered if…" That's when I burst into tears, and when he reassured me. Told me he was on his way. That everything would be alright. That he loved me. That's when I realised that some things you can rely on, and that maybe, just maybe I would get my happy family.


End file.
